


No Stone Left Unturned

by PoweredJellyBeans



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-10
Updated: 2015-11-10
Packaged: 2018-04-30 22:03:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5181302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoweredJellyBeans/pseuds/PoweredJellyBeans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Cassandra had ran out of truths to say during What Lies Beneath the Stones? The truth cell forces Ezekiel to reveal one of his most shameful, well protected secrets.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Stone Left Unturned

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all! =)  
> I absolutely love The Librarians and Ezekiel Jones and the last episode inspired me to write this. I'm not the best writer but I hope you enjoy this. This is not beta-ed so feel free to point out any major mistakes. Thanks for reading! =D

Ezekiel watched Cassandra pace back and forth spouting off truths. He was only half listening. She had been rambling for some time now. At first it was interesting and even kind of funny to hear all about Cassie’s dark secrets. For someone who was seemingly sweet, she had a bit of a mean streak. However, she was at the boring ones now but as long as she was happy to continue, Ezekiel was happy to sit back and stay silent. He might not lie but he did omit the truth and keep things to himself when he wanted to. It wasn’t technically lying, he told himself. 

Ezekiel was pulled out of his daze as Cassandra fell silent and the doors began to close. She stuttered over her words and turned to give him a shrug. She had run out of truths. It was time for Ezekiel to take over. As he rarely gave any personal information out, he supposed he could get away with harmless truths. He could reveal things about himself that would come up in a normal conversation and wouldn’t affect the way people saw him. 

“I actually hate chocolate,” Ezekiel admitted. He was quite pleased with himself. Even though Cassie gave him a shocked look, telling the truth wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be. If he just kept this up he wouldn’t have to reveal the secret he was most ashamed of. “Although, hot chocolate isn’t so bad.” 

“I vomited in my mouth and swallowed it once,” Cassie chipped in. She looked embarrassed but Ezekiel gave her a grateful look. He didn’t have to continue this on his own.

“I had to hide in a closet during a heist for four hours.”

“I told someone I didn’t like their hair because I was jealous,” Cassie squeaked out. Her truths seemed like they physically pained her on an emotional level. Hopefully none of this would be remembered and held against them in the future. 

“I stole pizza from a delivery guy.” 

“I caught a spider and pulled it’s legs off to see if they grew back.”

“I have to sleep with the light on after watching horror films.”

“I’m not attracted-” Cassandra paused abruptly. She looked slightly horrified at what she was about to say. She gave Ezekiel pleading, wide-eyed look. The door to the cell began to slowly close. She obviously didn’t want this particular truth to be revealed. Ezekiel did the only thing he could to stop the door from closing: he blurted out his darkest, most hidden secret. It was a knee-jerk reaction and he couldn’t help it. He just wished he could have stayed secret. 

“The reason I prefer movies to books is because I’ve only recently learned to read!” The door swung open again but Ezekiel hung his head in shame. He’d done a pretty decent job in hiding his illiteracy his whole life and now he couldn’t undo what he’d just done. His fellow librarians far all so clever, geniuses in fact. He could never measure up to them, he could only pretend to. 

When Cassandra stayed silent, Ezekiel glanced up. She was just staring at him, eyes wide and jaw slackened. When she caught his gaze, her eyes softened. He almost couldn’t bare the pity directed at him so he looked down again. 

“Wha- how, I mean...Ezekiel?” Cassandra was lost for words, not sure how to reply to this particular truth. The door was starting to close again so Ezekiel figured he might as well explain with a few more truths. Hopefully Cassie won’t think any differently of him after this.

“I grew up in the foster system,” Ezekiel paused whilst the door opened again. “My foster parents weren’t very nice so I ran away. I didn’t go to school, if I did I’d be put back there so I never learned to read. 

“I started stealing for food and clothes. I got real good at it. Started to get noticed. Other runaways like me took me in and we’d go out stealing together. Hardly any of us had an education. We were too busy surviving to read and write. 

“Eventually the authorities caught up with a lot of us, put us back in the system but I managed to escape. I had no one, they’d taken them away from me. So I kept stealing, trying out riskier jobs. I was beginning to get noticed.” Ezekiel looked up to find that he had Cassandra’s full attention. Her expression still extruded sympathy but there was also a spark of curiosity in her eyes, just brimming under the surface. Ezekiel had already told her this much, he might as well tell her the rest. 

“An agent from MI-6 approached me one day,” Ezekiel said as a small rueful smile graced his lips. “I, uh, bit him and made a run for it. I thought he was going to arrest me or take me back in the system but he wasn’t after me for that. He had a job for me. He wanted me to go back to England with him. He gave me food, a safe place to stay that night. I wanted to repay him so I said yes. 

“He took me under his wing, taught me a lot of what I know about computers. When he found out that I couldn’t read or write he started to teach me that too. I liked the man, he was always kind to me, didn’t judge me like some of the other agents there.” 

“So why did you leave?” Cassie prompted when Ezekiel didn’t resume his story. He gave her a sad smile and his eyes began to fill with tears.

“He was due to be sent out on a mission so he gave me a reading task before he went. ‘I want you to finish reading this before I come back, then you read to me’ he told me but...” Ezekiel’s voice wavered slightly. He had to take a few calming breaths before carrying on. “he never came back. Killed in action.” A solitary tear left a trail down the young man’s face. 

“I left after that, I couldn’t bare to be there any more. I couldn’t pick up a book for a long time without it reminding me of what I’d lost. Joseph, that was his name. Joseph was the closest thing that I’d ever had to a father.”

“Ezekiel, I’m so sorry,” Cassandra said. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears too. She definitely wasn’t expecting a truth like this from Ezekiel. He just seemed so happy, so confident all the time, it was hard to believe that he’d been holding all this back. In a way, she was angry that it had to come out this way. Maybe being truthful all the time wasn’t the best course of action? Lies and secrets protected you from facing reality. Omitting the truth had become a form of escapism for Ezekiel, just like reading books was for Cassandra. 

Ezekiel cleared his throat and roughly scrubbed at the watery lines left behind by his recent tears. He took a few deep breaths before fixing a cocky grin his face but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. 

“So, I’ve had my turn, now it’s yours,” he said replacing his sorrow with his usual laid back façade. He moved to the back of the cave and sat down whilst Cassandra picked up on where Ezekiel had left off. Although he gave off the impression of boredom, an experienced eye would catch the exhaustion that had overcome him. This was the position Jake found them in a short while later. 

As they all left the cell, Cassandra shot Ezekiel a meaningful look. It was a look of acceptance, confidence and confidentiality. She wouldn’t tell anyone his secrets and he wouldn’t tell anyone hers. Ezekiel held her gaze before giving her a deep nod. He gave her his first genuine smile in return. 

* * *

Eve did one final sweep of the library before heading home. Jenkins was drinking his tea going over some records and tinkering with some artifact simultaneously whilst muttering under his breath about the mess the librarians had caused over the last few days. Stone was still on his laptop, intently typing and completely focused on the article he was writing. He didn’t even notice Eve check up on him. She smiled softly before searching for the remaining two librarians. She hadn’t seen them at all since they had got back. 

It took her a while but she finally found them in a nearby reading room. She hovered just in the doorway and watched them for a while. They’d made themselves comfortable in the armchairs. Both of them had a mug of hot chocolate in front of them and they both held a copy of Harry Potter the the Philosopher’s Stone in their hands. It appeared that they were taking it in turns to read to each other. 

Eve was too far away to hear what they were actually saying but Cassandra said something that made Ezekiel let out a loud laugh and swat Cassie playfully with his book. Eve smiled, a little taken aback by what was happening. She closed the door quietly and started to head back to the back door in the main library as she felt like she was intruding on a private moment. Her librarians were all okay, it was time to call it a night and head home.


End file.
